>> gretchen: super bowl time! brian is going there tomorrow. join us. a brand new look at the state of the economy, a new report showing jobs in america is still jobs number one, claims by the unemployed dropping to 415,000, the second drop in as many weeks, but still we're well above 400,000, economists tell you we have a long way to go in chipping through that number. i'm bill hemmer, good to have you with us, martha: i'm martha maccallum, these numbers are pretty g. you put them together with the last report we got but unemployment still well over 9 percent. bill: well over 9 percent.

we need to see a consistent drop for any sign of a recovery and for so many that's not happening. stuart varney, fox business network, good morning, did we say it all? >> i think really did. the truth there is the numbers are all over the place. we get them every thursday morning at 8:30 eastern time, up one week, way down, then up again, all over the place. now, some of this can be attributed to the weather. got it. but if you strip out the weather and you look the at long term trend, the number of new people filing these claims, the trend is down, but it's nowhere clear strong enough to make a real difference to our underlying unemployment situation. nineteen months into a recovery, you should be creating at least 250,000 jobs a month, and you should be seeing way down, at maybe 250,000 new claims for unemployment each week. nowhere near it. bill: 19 months. wow. retailers, though, a bit of a mixed bag. >> yes. bill: are you seeing something from january that shows that america is spending money?

>> yes, we are. they are spending more on credit cards, visa's profits went up, retail sales in january were solid. you're seeing a tale of two economies here. overall, big picture, we're spending some money, the economy is growing, companies are profitable. go downstream a little bit and you'll see a housing crisis and jobs crisis. it's a tale of two economies, two economic realities, bill. bill: it is unique for all of us now. stuart, see you at 9:20fbn. martha: we want to show thaw president obama is at the national prayer breakfast right now, just making comments about egypt. we'll get those to you momentarily. but he's delivering his comments on faith at the national prayer breakfast this morning. it is an annual event, and we will continue to apprise you exactly of what is being said as the president speaks to the group in washington, at 9:00 eastern time. bill: in the meantime there's breaking news in dallas, texas, the super bowl is there on sunday, and today, that town is frozen,

and now we have this giant apartment building that's just gone up in flames. a 3-alarm fire at an apartment building, where 75 firefighters are on the scene out of dallas, screen right. this is the imarpblgs only 20 minutes ago. they have done yo man's -- yoeman's work to try and extinguish those flames, northeastern part of the city, not known if they are occupied or under construction. hopefully it's the latter. a 3-story building north of downtown dallas, flames at one point were 60 feet in the air. look at the snow on the street, martha. dal a. texas took a hit from that storm the other day and it's still frozen. just two nights ago the temperatures dropped down to 10 degrees. wind chill was around zero. this is dallas, texas! they're going to get a break tomorrow and then saturday the temperatures go up to about 50 degrees, but right now they are froze then and that's a challenge for firefighters. the flames look like they've been put out. hopefully, no one was inside. we'll update in a moment, too. martha: extreme conditions

in so many places in the country and that's kind of the result of some of that. in the meantime, egypt of course is on the edge. this is an ongoing story that we need to stay on top of. there is a live look at cairo right now. so far, what we're seeing at the moment, small pockets, scuffles breaking out between protestors and supporters of the mubarek government. we saw incredible action last night. this is the molotov cocktails that were flying in the evening. at least # five people were killed in that violence last night, dozens more were injured before the egyptian army formed a barrier between the two sides, the pro mubarek side and protestors in the street. the country's prime minister is now apologizing for the violent attacks by government supporters. leland vitter is streaming live from cairo. leland, what is the latest from where you are right now? >> reporter: we've already heard a lot of automatic weapons firing into tahrir square here during the afternoon. it looked like the army was

going to try to take control of the situation, they made moves, they moved some of the pro mubarek protestors, those who are incredibly violent and basically accused of being hired thug, used to toss the molotov cocktails. the army has largely disappeared in tahrir square and you have the pro mubarek protestors and the protestors who began all of this, the ones who want mubarek gone, at it once again. we've seen the street battles, we've seen the same kind of attacks that we saw yesterday that are incredibly violent. this group has become antiwestern journalist, antijournalist and that's why we're holed up in one of these compounds. the other foreign embassies are using to try to evacuate their citizens out of egypt. as you know, the united states said get out, for every citizen. in fact they were so concerned about people getting out of here because of this violence and they're worried this is going to spread into chaos here in this country. they said even if your

passport has been expired for ten years it doesn't matter, come to the airport, we'll get you out. martha: wow. how is that going? is it your sense people are still struggling to leave? >> reporter: there's no question about that. the lines are long, the evacuation flights are all packed. the compound that we're in right now is where the australian and british embassies have all of their people staged. you have a bunch of guys in orange jackets here, running around, a lot of families, people are very nervous, very scared, we've only seen a few fights break out, and long lines at the airport -- a few flights out and long lines at the airport. bill: like the alamo in central cairo, the dead he saiders, holding out until the very end. comments from the president in a moment. we'll play that for you. in the meantime the senate did what republicans guarantee but the health care repeal vote fails, some democrats say the poll -- policy debate is now over but republicans say they will not be denied, that vote, 47-51, right along

party lines, all four republicans voting in favor. the senate minority leader, mitch mcconnell, saying the fight is not over, after this vote. >> we promised the american people we would have a vote in the senate to repeal omabacare, we just had that vote, every single republican voted to repeal, every single democrat voted to retain the 2700 page washington takeover of our health care. i think the american people understand fully this issue. and they know for sure where republicans and democrats are. bill: republicans say they will move forward with efforts to overturn the law. here's john cornyn from texas: >> as we go forward, as we continue to expose the flaws in this legislation, as the courts continue to review the decisions on these two federal judges who found this bill unstill, that we will prevail. repeal and replace this bill

with a bill that bends the cost curve, makes health care more tpaobdable and accessible to the american people. bill: the debate over whether the law is constitutional is to be settled by the u.s. supreme court. in 30 minutes we'll talk to the attorney general out of virginia, that attorney general is one of the leading members trying to challenge the law. he is breaking news this morning about how he wants this now fast-tracked to the u.s. supreme court. we'll have that for you 30 minutes away. martha: that is coming up. in the meantime, crews had to remove more than just snow and ice to reopen one of chicago's busiest streets, the city called in bulldozers. this is the image of this whole storm, i think, when you look at lake shore drive and the cars packed in with snow. literally they had to be rescued and evacuated from the highway which is known as lake shore drive, 900 cars, taken out of there, drivers stuck in one of the worst blizzards that has hit that city since the late 1960s, some people were stuck there for 12 hours. can you imagine? people in chicago are used

to pretty rough weather, folks, but this took a lot of them, even, by surprise. >> looks like a war. >> it's like frozen in time. the bus was frozen. like people was -- >> people were sitting on the bus. >> people were in the car. >> were in the car. trying to get it going. >> wow. >> too much snow. >> too much for you to walk through? >> yeah! >> i guess you're right. >> because you're coming off the lake. martha: look at those pictures! it's unbelievable. here's the bad news on top of the bad news. when they're digging out of the snow, now the temperatures are dropping, the wind chills are expected to hit 30 degrees below zero in chicago. wfld's patrick ellwood is live for us. what a scene it is there. >> hey martha, good morning to you. the other shoe has dropped here in chicago. we're on the southwest side of the city. it is so bitterly cold out

here this morning. the snow came through, third largest amount in the city's history, 20 inches, and the after effects are going to be felt for some time. side streets are nearly impassable. i'm walking on top of the center of a street now and each side you have a rut, but i tell you, if you slow down, which i did, you nearly get stuck. just a few moments ago, -- people are pretty cheery about this but there is harsh criticism for the people who got stuck on lake shore drive, 1000 cars there. why they shut down the drive -- down the drive, so many questions remain. it's going to be some time before the completely has -- before the city has completely dug itself out of this january 2011 blizzard here in chicago. so that's the situation from the southwest side of town. it is so cold out here, snow, all over the place, but i'm not telling anything you guys -- you guys anything that you haven't experienced a couple of times already in new york city. we're kind of joining the party late this winter.

now back to you. martha: i feel for you out there. that is a tough place to be right now. thank you very much, and best of luck to you guys as you try to dig out. it's freezing. it's going to melt. bill: nice to share the pain with some folks. martha: isn't it? >> bill: fox news alert, national prayer breakfast moments ago, more comments from the president, the latest on what's happening in egypt today. this is what he said only moments ago in washington, d.c.: >> we're also mindful of the violence that we're now seeing in the middle east, and we pray that the violence in egypt will end and that the rights and aspirations of the egyptian people will be realized and that a better day will dawn over egypt and throughout the world. bill: president obama moments ago, wanted to share that with you. we'll watch the comment the throughout the day and keep a close eye on what's happening in central cairo. central cairo seems to be the flashpoint that still

remains at the moment. more later. martha: we're going to talk about this in a moment. he says he has no regrets, donald rumsfeld on some of the most difficult decisions that he personally and professionally had to make. you know, he's been quiet for a long time. now we're hearing what donald rumsfeld's side of the story is and what is in his new book. bill: also one major u.s. city set to ban smoking on the beach, in the public parks, just about everywhere you go! we'll tell you where you can and cannot light up. martha: they're telling people where they can go. big developments in the effort to repeal health care. it failed on the senate floor yesterday, but it is not over, folks. republicans say that they're moving forward with their fight. >> we're moving in the right direction and i think there will be additional efforts. obviously, this was a big vote, it was a vote that we needed to have, it put everybody on the record. martha: supreme court may be the the next stop, folks. we're going to talk to virginia's attorney general ken cuccinelli who is leading efforts to uproot this law and he is

announcing efforts that he'll make here live in "america's newsroom" when we come back. stay with us.

martha: well, it was a scary scene for a bunch of kinder market neves -- kindergartners, their bus fell into a sinkhole. six kids were on that bus at the time. the students and bus driver were able to evacuate through the rear door. nobody was hurt, thank goodness. look at that thing! can you imagine? on your way to school? we've got a story to tell, ibm hemmer. bill: here's another story to tell, revealing memoir from former secretary of defense ronald -- donald rumsfeld defending the decision to go to war with iraq. k.t. mcfarland, good morning to you. you've known him and the people around him for how long? >> well, since the nixon and ford administration. bill: we're going back three, 3 1/2 decades now. >> and we had an adjacent

office in the west wing of the white house. bill: wow. a lot of what's going to be talked about in the book is his defense of the decision to go to war in iraq. >> right. bill: on the surface what do you make of what you've read so far? >> i haven't read the book, i've seen the report. i think what's happened is rumsfeld and others in the administration realize a lot of mistakes were made and they're scam bling for their place in history to describe the events as they saw it from their perspective but the interesting point is to take a step back and say what have you seen in the middle east this week? you've seen a real vindication of the bush freedom agenda. bill: do you think you can say that comfortably? >> well, there were a lot of mistakes made in the iraq war, absolutely, but their real objective was to say if you look the a the middle east in its entirety, there were a lot of awe authoritarian regimes not allowing political or economic freedom and what they thought was if iraq abe -- could be a well educated, population, successful, oil

wealthy, could be a beacon for the middle east if they would become a pro western democracy. bill: and if you could insert that in baghdad t. would follow. maybe in time that happens. >> we don't know yet. bill: a couple of revelations about his resignation, apparently he offered to resign on a number of occasion. sue: i'm not surprised by that, i know other administration officials had offered to resign and president bush asked them to stay. >> abu graib, he said he should have left after that, that was business hig -- his biggest regret. >> that doesn't surprise me, but abu graib was not something that don rumsfeld would have signed off on. i think that's something that happened at lower levels and frankly it's an example of something that happens when you take military officers, particularly reserve officers who aren't trained to do that stuff and put them in that position. >> in your time with him going back three or four decades, it's a long time to get to know someone, you have history with him and others, and i think the point you make officially iso initially is very well taken, this is an opportunity for those in charge of making many of the

decisions to set the record in a way that they want it to read. is that a fair way to recount history? >> and especially because mistakes were made and they know mistakes were made and they're saying from my perspective, i didn't make the mistakes. as you see in a number of the memoirs that have come out, they're all more or less saying the same thing, yet at the end of the day there were mistakes made, eliminated, dismantling the military, dismantling the iraqi civil service and allowing this sort of power vacuum to be created. i think the one interesting thing, the one group that doesn't get criticized is the u.s. military. bill: wow, okay. >> they've done their job. bill: the other thing, he says there are too many hands on the steering wheel when it came to driving the car in the iraq war. we're going to go over this when it comes out and more on that. k.t., thank you, appreciate your per inspective. it is unique for us. thank you, k.t. mcfarland. martha, what's coming up next in 19 past. martha: after the floods a new massive storm. what happens when 180-mile an hour winds pass through a

town? a live report from this unbelievable scene, next. phillip: -- bill: can't be good, right. the city that never sleeps, maybe the city that never lights up. it's not going to go too far, they say. the nanny state in the big apple? go figure.

bill: back to cairo. just want to share with you from what -- what we're learning from egypt news, a the travel ban is in effect and three foreign ministers, one of the three or all three who resigned on saturday morning, all assets have been froze been and we're watching this live picture streaming from tahrir square. we have not seen camels

today, horses, but we have seen tanks overnight as the army looks to take more control over what's happening in cairo. back to that story, president obama talking about it moments ago. we'll bring it to you in "america's newsroom". >> why don't you stop smoke something. >> why do we bring this up again? >> you know, smoking. it's a bad habit but i have it. and it's a legal product. i choose to smoke. leave me alone. martha: john bain every, speaker of the house. he may want to steer clear of new york city this spring, the big apple set to adopt one of the toughest antismoking laws. the smoking ban could cover 1700 parks and public places like central park, 14 miles of public beaches, board walks and pedestrian plazas, even the crossroads of the world, times square may not be able to light up folks. the ban goes into effect 90 days after mayor bloomberg signs that bill and that seems likely. he is a big supporter of

this. david lee miller is live in our newsroom with more on this. david, you watch folks coming out of the buildings, they smoke outside. where the heck are they going to go now? >> reporter: they can still smoke in their own homes, martha, but many fear that down the road they may lose that right. but new yorkers right now, extremely outspoken and very emotional about this bill that has been passed by new york city council. one smoking rights group says that they are going to protest. they don't know what they're going to call the protest yet, maybe a smoke-in or a smoke-out but they say when the law takes effect what they want to be able to do is light up in disobedience of the law, it's a $50 fine but they say they are going to make a point and they're going to light up in beaches and city park. smoking rights advocates simply say the law here has gone too far, they argue, for example, that automobile exhaust is dangerous but cars are still allowed to drive through some of the city parks, others here applaud the city council's

actions. >> there is caution through there. this is a pollution thing. they give out more pollution than a pipe smoker or cigar smoker would. >> i'm for it. i don't like cigarette smoke, i think it's dangerous to inhale, secondhand smoke is very dangerous. >> worth noting here, 478 municipalities across the country do have similar bans in effect, including such cities as san francisco and chicago. and the city council had before it, martha, a sort of compromise bill yesterday that would have allowed smoking outside, in some specially designated areas such as beaches and parks but that version of the bill did not pass. martha: all right. there's bound to be controversy on this one. david lee, thank you very much, in our newsroom today. bill: i think that sound bite from boehner will live on for a long time, leave me alone! >> martha: leave me alone! bill: we are going into the trefrpbgs on the border,

many americans living in fear there, insisting something must be done. plus -- >> they've been admitting that the health care bill needs a lot of work, there are a lot of things they can change, a lot of things that aren't right, so why didn't they do that with us when they did the health care bill? >> martha: this is not going away, folks, the law may need work but republicans failed to repeal it on the senate floor. why that failure may be a victory for the gop in the end, and that's one man's opinion. we'll talk about that in "america's newsroom" when come back.

bill: 9:30, russian security chief saying several people have been detained with information on the bombing at moscow's biggest airport. it killed dozens. >> cult leader charles manson caught with a smuggled cell phone, california correction officials could not say who he was calling at the time or how manson got the phone. it's the second time he's been caught with a cell phone. got you wondering why, huh martha? hello! >> martha: why a cell phone in a california prison. that's the question of the day. in the meantime the health care repeal vote may have failed on the senate floor but karl rove says it does not hurt republicans, he says they're just getting a vote to happen is a blow to president obama's health care law in his opinion.

congressman anthony weiner claims a repeal would hurt one very important group of americans. listen to what he says. >> what it comes down to, if you're a senator, do you want to take away health for seniors to fill the doughnut hole, gap in prescription drugs, if you want to take that benefit away, vote to repeal. martha: now a bipartisan plan to overhaul the medicare system may be picking up steam in washington. you've heard the republicans don't have any alternatives. this is an alternative that has been put into the mix that we want to analyze today. rick santorum, former pennsylvania senator, of course and fox news contributor, doug schoen is former pollster to president clinton, also a fox news contributor. gentlemen, welcome, good to have you here on this thursday morning. it's always good to see you. it seems to me this is sort of the response that you get, you know, when you ber view a democrat on this issue and you interview a republican on this issue, they're both coming back and saying if we don't get our way in this health care reform debate, seniors are going to suffer. i mean that, is the message that is going forward. rick.

>> well, first off, seniors will want to get really hammered in the obama health care bill, they have half a trillion dollars in medicaid. martha: not according to anthony weiner. >> they got an expansion of the medicare prescription drug program, but that program was designed to do two things, take care of seniors who were poor and needed drug coverage and those who had high uses of prescription drugs. it did both, it left a hole in the middle for those that could frankly afford to do it and that was a good allocation of mope. the democrats that's okay, we're going to throw more money at seniors to offset the fact that we're making huge cuts in medicare. i don't think that's selling. it's not selling amongst seniors, omabacare is not a popular program amongst seniors and what you mentioned is that medicare is in trouble, we have to do something about these entitlement programs, and adding more cost in the medicare prescription drug program doesn't solve the problem. martha: you know, seniors are watching this program so

closely. they are very concerned about the cough krapblgs they're -- coverages they're going to get, they've become used to a certain amount of coverage and we're learning that this year's cuts to the medicare advantage program is going to be up to $6 billion wh-f we questioned people in favor of this plan, how are you going to pay for it, $500 billion with cuts in medicare. >> well, that's exactly right. and what many centrist democrats and republicans say is the only way to reform entitlements is to do it as part of an overarching balanced budget plan that's done on a bipartisan basis, ideally with tax reform as part of the mix, because rick is right, we don't want to get into a tit for tat about the medicare program and individual items. we want to fix it for now and for future generations. and the only way to do that is on a bipartisan basis. kent conrad, chairman of the budget committee, is for it, i think it makes good sense

if you're a democrat or republican. martha: the bottom line issue is we see doctors back away from accepting medicare patients, you see companies saying you know, we can't meet this criteria, we cannot cover everybody with every single condition they have out there, we simply can't afford to do it. so in the end, rick, you know, it's a lovely used and everybody when you throw out the pluses in this say oh sure, i'd like to cover my kids until they're 26, or whatever, but it's simply too many people getting too much coverage president doesn't it sort of -- you can't afford it, it's going to collapse under the weight of all of these benefits. >> well, that's right. we took this health care system that was covering 85-90 percent of americans out there and said we're going to redo the whole system so we can cover a whole bunch of folks and we're going to spend trillions of dollars to do it and then we're going to off set that by saving money in the medicare program, which was the biggest place that we needed to save money. the problem is the medicare program itself is in trouble and needs to be reformed to save it.

and so in a sense, to create a new benefit we create even a bigger problem of trying to solve the existing problem, which is the bankruptcy of medicare. so it is a bad decision all the way around. martha: all right. this is not going anywhere fast, and i urge everybody to take a look at this bipartisan plan that alex rivlin and paul ryan have come up with, it deserves attention and deserves a reading on everybody's part. we'll get into this next time with you both. good to see you both. bill: in our nation's capitol, today is the national prayer breakfast in washington, d.c., an event every year that brings washington together, frankly. president obama, finishing up his address a moment ago, and he offered prayers for congresswoman gabrielle giffords and right now her husband, astronaut mark kelly is speaking, delivering the closing prayer. he has been by his wife's side since the shooting in tucson, using sights like twitter to report on her progress, kelly and giffords

familiar with high-tech tools like the ipad, in fact, she sat down with interviewers for the new ipad newspaper, the daily, it was launched yesterday. she talked with the daily only a few weeks before the tucson attack, and anita vogel is reporting that live in l.a. tough when you see mark kelly there in washington. good morning to you anita. >> reporter: good morning to you bill. the daily has been working hard, gearing up for this launch, talking to a variety of news makers, including congresswoman gabrielle gifards, a member of the science and tech -- science and technology committee, she's very tech-savvy and the datey caught up with her to talk about technology, specifically her use of the ipad. >> throughout congresswoman gabrielle giffords' progress we received updates from her husband and doctors, on day 12 after the shooting we learned she was practicing a favorite past time, scrolling through an ipad, something she relies on for her job. >> i don't have a direct flight from tucson to the

united states capitol. i spend a lot of time on the plane. being able to carry an ipad, particularly being able to have all my documents in the clouds, to be able to access speeches and briefing materials, has really made a big difference. >> known for her rapport with her constituents on both sides of the aisle it's no surprise she likes to use technology to help build those relationships. >> i like to show folks how i get my news, i like to be able to show them how we keep up with our social media. we're one of the top social networkers in the congress and a lot of that is managed through the ipad. that's pretty cool. >> we continue to get updates from giffords' husband, astronaut mark kelly. just the other day, this tweet on his twitter page. today was a huge day for g.g., lots of progress. no question, a tech-savvy couple. >> my husband and i both have ipads, we got them at the same time. so we are in bed together, show each other stuff on our ipads, so it's a great tool,

it's a lot of fun. >> and you can see this entire interview exclusively at the daily on your ipad, and if you have any trouble with that, you can go online to the daily.com and it will give you simple instructions there, and of course, bill, there will be updates on gabrielle giffords' recovery progress. bill: a great day, our best to gabby. martha: great to see her talking in that daily interview there. let's get a look at the markets for you as things get rolling this morning anthursday, the dow jones industrial average is down about three points, about four points now, very big move, of course, over the last couple of days, up over 12,000, 12037, so market watchers can see whether or not it can maintain those levels and stay up over that 12,000 mark for a while as the earnings come in on wall street. we'll keep an eye on that. bill: how about that, who would have thought that. it may have died in the senate but the repeal of

health care far from over, the attorney general's latest announcement and you'll hear it from his mouth, here in three minutes in "america's newsroom".

martha: just what a flood ravaged nation does not need, a raging cyclone, winds up to 180 miles an hour, australia's most powerful storm in a century, top ling homes and businesses, but as bad as this looks, thankfully, it you can believe it -- if you can believe it, nobody was hurt in this cyclone. people did heed the orders to evacuate. david, tell us about this, how strong was it? >> reporter: martha, as you said, yes, 180 miles an hour, the full force of it hit midnight local time and it ripped into entire towns, smashing up the main street, as you can see from some of the videos, the yachts and boats were swept from the seasides, but the amazing

thing, the real relief, is so far there are no reports of fatalities. it seems it was a well organized operation, with thousands of people going into evacuation shelters. but there is still a lot of cleaning up to do, and they're still trying to contact those in communities that have had phone lines cut, to make sure that everyone is all right martha. martha: david, thank you very much, david piper on that story. boy, australia has had a heck of a time. very bad situation weather wise there. for more on that awful cyclone and how people are coping, look at the incredible pictures at fox news.cole and we'll keep you on top of that as those pictures continue to come in. bill: the storm was like the size of the u.s., right? developing in "america's newsroom", the man behind one of the biggest legal challenges to the president's new health care law today is calling for that case to be fast tracked to the u.s. supreme court. now, the first challenge was launched by virginia's attorney general ken

cuccinelli. he's my guest now from his home state. sir, good morning to you. >> good morning. bill: why have you moved towards favoring fast track? >> well, we've been talking with our governor, governor mcdonnell here, and actually talked to the justice department for about seven weeks at the end of 2010. they did not agree to do this, but they did say in their most recent brief in our appellate case that this is a case of the highest order of magnitude of importance, and that is one of the major conditions for the supreme court to expedite a case. in virginia alone, without providing one single person another bandaid, we're going to incur about 20, $30 million of costs just for virginia's government to get ready to come ply with this law and as we saw early they are week in florida, judge vincent -- vinson did what we had asked in virginia to do and that is throw out the entire statute because the mandate is unconstitutional. so with that outcome it does

seem entirely reasonable to expect the supreme court may do the same thing and we want to eliminate the uncertainty in both our governmental budgets and in the private sector which is -- has famously got billions of dollars sitting on the sidelines as uncertainty grows because of what our federal government does instead of shrinks. >> you know the superior comhas the authority to take the case or not. are you saying you expect them to take it? >> this is an extraordinary remedy, but it is a case that fits their qualifications. it is completely within their discretion whether or not they skip the appellate courts or not. they absolutely have the authority to do this and they do do it. they just don't do it very often. bill: that's a fact.

utah is out there saying it's not even enforceable in our state. but as you mentioned, in the supreme court, we get a lot of questions from viewers on this. bya, because you asked, elena -- will elena kagan recuse herself from the decision regarding health care reform? the reason we ask that, she was solicitor general from the white house, that's where the first challenge was launched there. do you believe she must recuse herself or do you have a position on that? -- a position on that? >> well, that's a decision that each of the justices make but i'll tell you she appears to have already made it. there have been earlier requests to expedite cases, one in particular out of california, where very little had happened in the case, but she voted no, but she did vote on the case and that tells us she's going to vote on them all and she has done the analysis and presumably in the slitter

general's office did not work on these cases because that's the condition, so presumably that condition has been fulfilled and she has gone through that analysis and it appears she will participate fully in all of these. bill: you know part of the reason is everybody predicts it's going to be a 5-4 decision one way or the other lanea kagan could have a significant impact on how that goes and you believe now she stays on the case when it gets there? >> yes. that's absolutely our expectation when this case is considered. and frankly, you'll probably see her vote one way or the other on our motion to expedite the case. so if she was going to recuse herself, even those sorts of votes, she likely would not participate in, and we've already seen her participate in one. bill: thank you, ken cuccinelli, the attorney general in virginia, as the beat moves on. thank you sir for your time. shoot an e-mail. >> good to be with you. bill: you as well. shoot me an e-mail, we read

each one of them, don't we martha. martha: every day. bill: bya, because you asked. martha: was an accusation that sends shivers down your spine. an al-qaeda leader, working directly with on airline worker. the tragedy that could have happened. we're going to tell but that straight ahead. bill also one of the most dangerous cities along mexico's border with the u.s., only a stone's throw from el paso in texas. steve harrigan takes the dangerous drive along that border.

bill: a rogue turkey, ethel kennedy says the loose turkey is likely hers. she sent her son robert k.

to buy a thanksgiving not to eat but to show the kids what the turkey looks like. watch this, screen left, screen right at the compound in h kwhr-fplt a -- hyannis. ethel says she is confident that is her turkey that attacked the mailman! give me that letter now! i want that package. martha: i want one just like him! all right. in the meantime, back to the story for you. as mexico's drug war spirals out of control, americans are losing lives. steve harrigan is driving the entire length of the border for a close look at the state of america's third war. he is live from the first stop in el paso, texas, just across the border from jaurez, one of the deadliest cities in the world. hi steve. >> the homeland security chief was just here to try

and reassure people who live along the border with mexico that that border area is safe but after a number of murders, including the brutal slaying of an american missionary, a lot of people here don't feel that way. >> ♪ >> ♪ >> south texas came together this week to bury a legendary missionary, nancy davis, a victim of drug cartel violence in mexico. police suspect the gunmen were after the davis' truck. sam davis was with his wife when she was murdered. >> i was doing about 120 miles an hour, by the time i hit that truck, fellows in camouflage, with assault rifles opened fire on us and one of the bullets came through the back window and struck my wife in the head. i stiffened, i grabbed the steering wheel and got read question for the bullets to hit me in the side, they turned around and opened fire with automatic rifles and just -- it was terrible, and i just laid as low as i could. i could barely see over the dash. i thank god that -- two things, i know she's with him, and the one big thing that i'm so grateful for,

the instant the bullet struck her in the back of the head, she was unconscious, never suffered one second. >> the davises built churches in mexico for 38 years, but because of drug violence, sam davis says the situation today is impossible. >> the investigation into the davis death is being hailed entirely by mexican police and they have a conviction rate of under 2 percent. martha, back to you. martha: boy, what a story and what a remarkable statement from her husband. steve harrigan, thank you very much for bringing thattous. good work. bill: similar story, arizona's immigration law, could it go national. what one lawmaker is proposing that could change the face of immigration reform in america. this is intriguing. we'll get to that. martha: and here's the second whammy of this whole thing, a destructive ice storm, battering 2000 miles in the u.s. we're going to show you some of the hardest hit areas and it's still happening.

getting hit with the icex@ñ now. ♪

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martha: "fox news alert," there is new violence in the streets of cairo, reports of shots fired as things get dark there, almost 5:00 p.m. in cairo in the conveyo square. that is how we start a brand new hour of "america's newsroom," glad to have you with us today, i'm martha maccallum. bill: i'm bill hemmer. day nine and counting back to tuesday of last week when it start, violent tug-of-war playing out in front of the world's carries, at the moment we understand mubarak supporters are falling back as the regime protesters advance in that square. martha: it's an extremely fluid situation that and change in an instant as we have seen playing out the past several days, john roberts is following the developments from london now, what can you report to us, at this hour? >> reporter: good morning to you, martha, things are changing literally by the second. in downtown cairo, up until now it was a lot calmer than

yesterday, when we saw the running battles and charges on horses and camel-back, from pro-hosni mubarak supporters and the last couple of minutes things have turned for the worst, the egyptian military between the two sides, shots rang out, a man fell and is being carried off, by one side, we're not sure which side now, as far as we know he is the only serious casualty of the day, and though there has been the odd skirmishes going on between the two sides. it is not clear yet why the military did not do yesterday what it is doing today. though many people who know a lot about egypt, many of them in cairo, speculating that the pro-hosni mubarak forces out yesterday might have been government employees. some of them potentially even police who were in civilian uniform and -- clothing and, the military did not want to fire on their fellow government employees. clearly, though, the military now taking a different role. trying to get people off of the streets. five people were killed in the skirmishes between yesterday and

this morning and hundreds upon hundreds injured. and, many journalists and not just western journalist, but from the arab world, were targeted yesterday, many of them injured for their own safety, the military and interior department has been rounding up a lot of those journalists today, saying, we need to take you to an area of protection. so you aren't caught up in whatever violence may happen on the streets today and journalists are independent operators, and don't need to be under the protection of the interior ministry or the military. and, this is being seen by many journalistic organization and u.s. state department as an attempt to get people from telling the story and the state department expressed its concern that journalism is being repressed in egypt, and we'll have to keep an eye on that. to see how that goes over the next few hours. martha: very important to get the story out, obviously. john roberts, thank you very much, reporting this morning from london. bill: he heard from john mccain, not mincing words about what he expects from hosni mubarak,

saying the egyptian leader should go now. >> the time has come for him to arrange for a transition that has the army, pro-democracy elements and others in a transition government so we can have free, fair and open elections. bill: and the senator saying the best way to prevent a radical islamic government from filling the void is to have an open, transparent process during the transition of power. now, we know a lot of you are following the egypt crisis on-line and are on your computers while watching our program and we have correspondents reporting live out of cairo all over the region. for the latest information an developments from our teams in egypt, middle east and beyond, log onto web, and there's plenty of information, for you, right there. on-line. martha: the monster storm, at least this particular monster storm may be gone but left a huge mess, from texas to maine, really, as folks dig out, my gosh, the person falling into the snow, and 12 deaths have

been blamed on the storm, two feet of fresh snow on the ground in the upper midwest and roofs collapsing under the snow-weary situations in the northeast as well and people in wisconsin even saying, they haven't seen it that bad there for decades. >> towards the bottom it is worse and towards the top is lighter but there is so much of it, you get tired. >> stopped a lot of people, that have low cars. snow gets beneath and picks them up. >> i haven't seen it this bad since the 1960s. martha: it is just unbelievable out there. and the airlines are trying to get back on track today. they cancelled 13,000 flights, and imagine trying to get through that backlog and, that is 3,000 more cancellation, to put it in perspective, than the days after christmas. bill: which was a big storm and how about the guy on skis in chicago, one way to get through it, right. martha: exactly. bill: now the ice and the worst part of this, freezing rain and

ice bringing down power lines. utility crews now racing to restore electricity, to thousands of frigid homes and businesses in ohio, pennsylvania, and new jersey. wtxf's reporter joins us, how are you doing, good morning to you! >> reporter: bill, we are doing better when it comes to the power, philadelphia's largest utility company has the third worst storm ever this week and they've got power back on, 200,000-plus customers, but, the problem from the storms remain, especially on the roads, even though we had very warm temperatures, 60° yesterday, and, we went back down into the 20s, so, we had a refreezing of all of these huge piles, of snow, and started to melt. and, so far today we have had a deadly and dangerous day on local roads and ramps. with ice on them, lots of overturned vehicles hitting icy patches and we have three dead in a car crash into a school. now on a south jersey beach

community, just before 7:00 and the sun coming up this morning, and had a motorcyclist hit a tractor-trailer and you have to wonder why are you riding a motorcycle out in the cold weather and walking isn't safer, either. look at the huge piles of snow, plowed up high at almost every intersection. and that is really cutting a lot of visibility down because no one can see around these things and -- at intersections and we had a woman hit by a car as she left the local hospital visiting her husband and she was killed here. a lot of big problems and the salt tracucks are put, because when it remained it washed away and you hear about dangers of second-hand smoke and how about the dangers of secondhand sodium intake, kicked up around the local roads and in philadelphia we are having trouble but we aren't complaining, seeing how bad things are in chicago and

other places. bill: thanks, from philadelphia. martha: this is coming in, we want to take you to the scene in miami, oklahoma. this is a river rescue. that is underway, right now. the westbound lanes of i-44 on the will rogers turnpike, look at this car. and, they are attempting to make a rescue, we understand as the fire and rescue folks are on the scene, assisting with the rescue of 8 people, in the vehicle. unbelievable. let's listen into the local report. >>... most flights going to joplin, either to st. john's or freeman hospital are rescue flights and let's hope it remains that way. >> i think this is an interesting observation and i -- maybe our viewers are thinking that as well. this type of vehicle, obviously, more high-profile, obviously an extremely sturdy-type vehicle put it has a sun roof and you have the entire section of the back of the pickup truck and the reports came in these individuals were on the roof and

that could have been the fact they were out of the vehicle, once it hit and like you said, that in itself, knowing they've survived, gives us a good indication that, possibly, that is where... >> right now we're looking at the video we shot earlier. these divers, these are from the newton county dive team, now, this is a shot a short time ago and you can see, this might have been a half-hour ago, we have one gentleman in the water and they are obviously searching the vehicle, at one point they had an axe and busted out a window right there and we want to -- >> they are talking about busting out a window right there and the car apparently went down, off the turnpike, and into the spring river. and, the reports are there were 6 people, on top of the vehicle at one point, standing on top of the vehicle, which is just locked in ice. in this river and this is near miami, oklahoma and you can see,

this is some of the video of the rescue, as it was playing out and two people were stuck in the car, six on top of the car, at one point. and it sounds like they were able to get all of them onto -- out to get the medical help. and the westbound lanes are used for medical helicopters to land on the highway, to deal with the situation. this is incredible. bill: miami, oak was one of the hardest hit areas in the northern part of the state, northeastern part of the state, we showed on the map yesterday that had up to two feet of snow. now, this scene here in the river, makes you wonder, at what point were these 8 people stranded? if that storm hit a day-and-a-half ago, how long were they inside that car, and how long were they sitting on top of the car? waiting for a rescue? 8 people, inside, can you imagine spending the night out there? how do you survive the hypothermia? martha: that is a very good question and you wonder what led to this, if ice, slid off the at the end of the year pike in ice

and it looks like a huge drop from the central part of the bridge and we don't know what the banks look like, if it is easy to go off the turnpike and slide down into the area. it is extraordinary, the river looks like it was almost iced over and it is locked in, and hard to imagine what these folks have gone through and -- we don't have an update on their medical condition and seems like they have everybody out and are getting the medical help, who knows? bill: if they were on the highway when the blizzard hit they could have been driving in the blinding snow. and not know where they were going. and if the car landed up right, perhaps that saved their lives, and if there was ice on the river at the time, perhaps it prevented the car from submerging to give them a little bit of a lift to keep them out of the party and have been taken to local hospitals, miami, oklahoma, northeastern part of the state, a large native american indian reservation is in that area. and who the victims are, we do not know, but, this image now coming out of miami, oklahoma,

is stunning. we could have expected some of this, to see the day after this storm, that covered 2,000 miles, in the central part of the country, and we were bound to come across something and saw downtown chicago, that is nothing compared to what these people have experienced. martha: they say they dropped a basket over the edge of the bridge, in order to rescue these people. which, you know, must have been difficult to get out to them, there's a boat that sort of is alongside the car, a flat-bottom rowboat, also used as part of the rescue attempt and, you have to wait until the snow clears to get a look at what is going on out there and as you say, who knows how long these people might have driven right off the road and landed in the water and is highly possible no one saw it happen or reported it happen when it happened. bill: you wonder where they were headed when the storm was coming and everybody was alerted and if you have 8 people inside the vehicle, maybe they were trying to get cover at the moment.

i-44, the will rogers turnpike and if you are tuning in, that a a vehicle in the spring river, a stretch of highway that runs over the river and the highway patrol on scene and they called in numerous medical helicopters to land on the highway, as the crews worked their way down to the frozen river, they rescued, we're told, 8 people, six of whom were on top of the vehicle, waiting. for medical attention to be taken to a hospital. martha: this is where the road -- before the road goes to the bridge. and you wonder, as you say, when are driving in blinding snow, this is one of the medical helicopters we heard about and they closed off this side of i-44 to land the helicopters and medevac these folks out of there and we got a look at the side of the turnpike and it is possible that that happened, the car went all the way down the side bank area, into the water is one possibility. because it is -- up right in the water. and, we see... bill: is that a stretcher?

martha: yes. bill: the other thing we reported from yesterday, i-70, just east of this location, the stretches across kansas from st. louis to kansas city was shut down for the first time in 70 years, since the highway was opened and it has been reopened but gives you an idea how intense the storm grew. martha: and looks like one of the rescuers is coming out of this, what an unbelievable effort these guys have made, helping him with his lifejacket and he's been out -- and remember now is also, very, very cold, across this part of the country and that has been the second shoe to drop in all of this, dropping temperatures. and we'll get a handle on how -- you can see, the breath coming out of them is cold in that area. bill: the men on your screen, are in all likelihood the good samaritans who saved 8 lives and we'll check in with the local hospital and watch the images and the picture and some say the 6th person was just rescued moments ago.

we saw the helicopter, what looked like a stretcher and ambulance still on the scene and we'll check in on their condition and let you know how they are doing but you wonder, if you survive a night in that blaze you are one tough soul. 13 minutes past the hour now, we'll take back to oklahoma when we get more here. okay. there are new development out of egypt, not only in the streets but also from the government. in cairo. a key figure issues an apology and we're hearing word about what the president's son, a man many thought would succeed his father, plans to do next, the analysis from lieutenant colonel oliver north here in new york with us, martha? martha: and new word that this former airline employee was connected to al qaeda. the shocking details of what he and the terror network had planned for americans. bill: also, the trial, prosecutors say she was mowed down by her own father. with his car. now, both we're hearing the interview between her dad and detectives, defense against

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bill: breaking news in the after effects of a severe blizzard in the heart of america. now, this is miami, oklahoma. northeastern part of the state, what you are watching there, is a scene that is absolutely incredible. that is the truck or some sort of suv that went off the highway, i-44, during this blizzard. and we are told 8 people, six of whom were on top of that vehicle in the middle of the spring river have been rescued and captain chris west of oklahoma highway patrol, good morning to you. >> good morning, guys. bill: are you on scene. >> i'm in oklahoma city but i have been watching it all morning and trying to be kept informed. bill: how are they doing, are the eight alive.

>> from what i understand, there was 8, six got out of the vehicle on the roof and tried to pull them out now and i don't have covnfirmation 0 of fatalities but that was a dramatic fall off of the bridge so there will definitely be injuries but i don't have any confirmed fatales. bill: did that he spend the night there, one assumes, since is the blizzard date a day-and-a-half ago. >> i don't have that. you know? we got the word about 6:30 this morning and of course we got crews out there as well as miami fire and brought in a dive team out of joplin, missouri, and they were closer and this is the far northeastern corner of oklahoma, near missouri, and the mall marker 332, the spring river and looks like it was probably a chevy avalanche and there was word there were 8 people in it, and, like you are saying we had a severe blizzard that came through and we're at day three and this is part of the hardest hit area in the

state and this particular portion of the roadway, interstate was shut down many, many, many hours especially on the westbound side and we had lots of snow, high drifts, and i'm sure those retaining walls on the bridge probably acted as a snow fence and collected a big drift and enabled the vehicle to go over it and make the fall to the river below. bill: how does a dive teamwork through a frozen river. >> i don't know, i'm not a diver but my hat is off to these guys. it looks like they're wearing some type of cold water gear and they are truly heros in my book, out there. dealing with these absolutely freezing temperatures, i'm telling you guys, here in oklahoma city the temps were 5°, and, maybe lower than that, i'm sure, up in that northeast part of the state and they are dealing with absolute unbelievable conditions up there, trying to make the rescue. martha: chris, martha maccallum here, a couple of quick questions for you. what stage are we at in all of

this? just to get or viewers up to speed. did you see the six people who were standing on top rescued? and are there still two people in that vehicle? >> i believe we're probably at thing, i believe we have already made the transport of the individuals that we recovered and have been in the helicopters, loaded up and med flighted out to hospitals and i think they took several to missouri and several to i believe, to st. francis, in tulsa. so, i can't confirm that there are any fatalities at this point. i have been watching the same stuff that you guys have been watching, but, i hate to do that, especially on national television, number one, i don't have it, but, again, we -- my hat is off to these guys doing the rescues and of course, our hearts and prayers go out to the victims and their families. martha: can you confirm that the truck or suv went over the side? because we were wondering

whether or not it went off the turnpike before the bridge and went down into the water. bill: well, right now, i believe that it went over, and that is from just listening to the reports, we have actually got a highway patrol lieutenant up in that part of the state that has been doing news broadcast as well and that is what he's indicating and i'll stay with that. martha: how cold is it there today? >> very cold here in oklahoma city. we had some one-digit temperatures overnight and i'm sure the northeast part of the state it is very, very cold as well. martha: any indication of timing on this, do they know when the truck went into the water. >> i don't have it confirmed but it started 6:30 for us, the times i got. i would like to think that since that is a turnpike, there was probably traffic on it and, possibly somebody observed it go over, and were able to make the phone calls to emergency crews. bill: how bad was it? we were told 24 inches and 50 mile-an-hour winds? that is a hurricane of snow.

>> yes. we had a blizzard, i'm hearing -- in the city, 12, 13 inches and north east part of the state, 20 to 21. there was a lot of snow, winds were blowing, i heard in some instances, there were ten foot snow drifts and this is a significant weather event for us. bill: do you know if the people on top of the vehicle contacted 911? did they make the contact? do you know if somebody passed on the highway above alerted... >> i cannot confirm that information, either way. bill: if we knew the answer it might give an indication as to their condition. if there were 8 people inside and six on top you wonder why the other two were not or whether or not they were in any condition to stand on top of that -- >> i tell you what, guys, when you consider the fall the vehicle took, and let's say that it didn't take a fall, let's say it drove down and broke the ice and went in the to the water, looking at the temperatures involved and in freezing water if anybody comes out of this

thing alive it is a miracle. bill: you are probably right about that. thank you, sir and thanks for spending time with us. >> take care, guys. bill: captain chris west, oklahoma highway patrol, in oklahoma city and is watching the images and in touch with his team out there. and, this is what he said, it will be a miracle. if the 8 survive. martha: an awful scene to look at and to imagine what these 8 people have been going through, and how frightening all of this must have been and we're waiting for reports on injuries or fatalities -8° in miami, oak, right now. and as he says, these folks are heros and are down there, trying to extricate people from the cars and the shot we are looking at on the right, we believe, is from the rescue itself and he's telling us that all 8 were recovered from the vehicle. we don't know their condition. we saw they cleared the highway to medevac people out of there.

very, very, very difficult situation. bill: and the mind reels if it went off the overpass and into the water face first into a frozen river, that must have been absolutely crushing impact, too. for the people inside. fox news radio with us, now, jennifer, good morning. >> good to be with you, i'm in chicago now and we're monitoring this and trying to get the latest, as you said, conditions of the victims unknown and we'd are waiting to find out and you have to be concerned in the situation with what is the condition of the rescuers. they are taking their own lives into their hands to go into the waters and watch these dramatic rescues and this is a dangerous situation for them as well. bill: you wonder about the medical teams able to land on the highway and how they accessed the river. the captain with us talked about dive teams being in the water. >> absolutely. bill: do you have more on that? >> pardon me. bill: more on that, jennifer? >> well, when you have dive teams they train and train for these types of situations. but again you have these

temperatures that are just extremely dangerous for them and is a dangerous situation as well and also looks like they are still going through, trying to go through the car and we have had reports all have been rescued but of course they want to make sure, once we get through this and we have an investigation team that moves in as well, so the divers will probably have to help with that type of thing, looking through that car as well, so, this is not going to be short lived by any means. this is going to continue throughout the day and the traffic is just a mess, heading into this area, and we have road closures, i-44, is -- we have word traffic heading from missouri into oklahoma diverted on i-44, by the highway patrol and is expected to last well into the early afternoon. martha: do you have any information on when they believe it happened? we're trying to nail down a timeframe whether or not the car was in there overnight. or whether it went off in the early morning hours. >> the crash was reported around

6:30 a.m. local time. you know, how long that car had been in the water, not known but the call was made 6:30 a.m. martha: at least that may be an indication, that, you know, it began this morning and witnesses at that time of the morning probably reported it immediately? is that your understanding? >> yes. and we have -- conditions like this, when you have winter conditions, visibility is hard to see, and there may have been many cars passed it, and it is unclear whether someone saw the cargo into the water. martha: and it is extremely cold there, 8 below in that part of northwest oklahoma, on the missouri border as we have been hearing and remarkable rescue efforts that are underway. bill: here's what we are trying to piece together, it came to us, 30 minutes ago, and, this is miami, oklahoma and they have two feet of snow and winds in excess of 50 miles per hour. and during the gut of the blizzard and the westbound lane of i-44, will rogers turnpike,

closed after the vehicle was spotted in the river, spring river below and highway patrols on scene and medical teams have responded and a dive team has gone into the icy, chilly, frigid river and the rescue of 8 team has taken place, where we are told at least 6 of the 8 were on top of what appears to be a four-door pickup truck with a cab in the back and that is what we're watching unfold, all 8, we believe, have been med vacs vacced out of there -- medevaced out of there and we hope they are with us. martha: and it is possible they were on their way to work, 6:30 a.m., across the bridge and we are waiting to find out whether it was a family or coworkers and where they were on their way to when it happened but it also happened after, you know, the worst part of the storm. but as we have been saying so much ice is involved in this storm as well, with these temperatures dropping and as the

freezing rain came down in a lot of parts of the storm as well, all kinds of warnings to stay off the road and now we are dealing with the day into it process, and is a terrible situation. you know, if ice led these folks as they were perhaps -- may be starting their day and six people were standing on top at one point. that is the report. we're hoping they at least were rescued. and they are on their way to medical care. bill: we mentioned miami and locals pronounce that is a "miama" from a thnative america indian tribe moved to the reservation, more than 100 years ago and there is a reservation, substantial, nearby and we don't have names or i'd tis for any of them and hope they are able to withstand severe hypothermia after diving into that river. firsthand, marc siegel is with us, dr., good morning to you. >> good morning, how are you.

bill: i'm doing fine. -8°, how long could a human being stand that? >> the first problem is because there is water there, it sucks out the heat out of the body but you know, bill, if they actually managed to get them into the hospital, the fact is, it is so cold, works to their advantage, paradoxically because the organs can stay alive longer and even if it looks like they are frozen, once they thaw them in the hospital they can get the heart restarted again and get them back going. and the cold sucks the life out of them, literally and when they are saved, it's an advantage to keep the organs alive longer. bill: i don't understand that. how is that possible, marc when the temperatures of this body can be forced to drop to such a low level. >> let me explain, because the tissue itself doesn't die as quickly at a low temperature and the heart itself will get stunned, the muscle doesn't actually die.

it literally freezes. so you can stay alive longer. now, the water in the area really worries me, because the water will literally take the body temperature down very low, and if they don't recover them, over a couple of hours and get them to the hospital, they are not going to survive. you are seeing a frostbite situation and the frostbite involves much more than the extremities, it starts to involve the deeper parts of the body. they can -- we might see something here where if they get cold for long, they might lose fingers and toes, but, again, the big concern is, what about the vital organs and the heart and brain and, surprisingly, the cold actually preserves the heart and brain. martha: interesting. martha here, dr. siegel. the amazing thing to me, if the story unfolds the way we are understanding it, if the truck went over the side of the bridge, and landed in the water, and six people were able to get out of the vehicle and stand on top of it, just the fact they survived the impact, was the

first hurdle they had to get through. >> martha, that made me thing of another issue, we don't know about injury and, unfortunately, you know, if there is bleedinger trauma and injury it will make it much more important they get to safety and medical treatment right away and is absolutely incredible that they survived the fall and, in addition to making sure they don't get frostbite and literally frozen, the issue is, what did they injury, are there fractures or blood loss. martha: how long can i pers a p survive, if it happened at 6:30 a.m. and they were there a couple of hours. bill: it reminded me of the ski lift accident we talked about a couple weeks ago and hopefully they bundled together, by preserving body warmth, huddling together you can extend that but this is not a situation with this kind of temperatures, especially with the water there, where anybody wouldn't be able to survive more than a few hours. martha: doctor, thank you.

bill: we were just putting up a map there to show where miami, oklahoma is, on the screen, lower left-hand corner and that was the early report, they were getting 20 inches of snow. through new bloomfield and chicago, and what the map doesn't show is next stream temperatures and wind that wind through there and we'll get back to the picture in oklahoma, and hopefully, find out the fate of the 8 in a moment here. live in "america's newsroom." ó

bill: break, news out of oklaho oklahoma, two of the eight, appears to be the case, 8 people stranded inside of the vehicle, we can now confirm that two of the 8 are dead. at what point they died, is not certain, whether or not they died inside the vehicle when it hit the ice or whether or not they -- hypothermia overcame them and it was too much to survive the night. six others we do believe are being treated at the hospital and we'll work on updates for you on that story when we get them here in "america's newsroom." a stunning thing out of miami, oklahoma. london now, authorities say a man, a former british airways employee, was working with al qaeda, specifically plotting attacks for radical u.s. born cleric, anwar al-awlaki, u.s. bound passenger planes, tarts and the airline's computer system and steve centanni live out of washington, and pleaded

guilty to some charges. >> reporter: the 31-year-old rajib kareem, pleaded guilty to taking part in terrorist training and denies he plotted to bomb an aircraft which is one of the allegations, and the prosecutor claims he was anxious to seek martyrdom and took a job in the call center to plot cyber attacks and actual attacks against british airways and allegedly covered up his radical views and went into deep cover, bill? bill: what is his connection with anwar al-awlaki, born in new mexico and now leading up al qaeda in the arabian peninsula out of yemen. >> reporter: exactly. prosecutors claim he sent coded e-mails to anwar al-awlaki, the american born radical and remains in hiding in yemen and ahmadinejad the leader of al qaeda in the arabian peninsula believed to be connected with several other terrorist attacks in the u.s., in recent years. bill: and wielding a lot of influence, steve, thank you, out of washington. martha: we are joined now by

lieutenant colonel oliver north, giving us his thoughts on what is playing out in the middle of tahrir square, in the middle of cairo. good morning, what do you make of what is coming from the white house, repeated calls hosni mubarak must go now. >> that is -- the now part is the problem. no doubt he has to go, and in fact he's made that pledge, he's appointed a vice president, and, which the country has not had for 30 years and, a great choice because suleiman is connected to the intelligence service and the muslim brotherhood will take full advantage of that and turned out the crowds in streets, counter protesters yesterday and today, protests and it will turn ugly inside of yemen, by an affiliate of the muslim brotherhood and same thing happening in amman and the problem is, by emphasizing the "now" the administration, which desperately wants to prevent their own jimmy carter moment may well do what he did in 1979, with the shah of iran, good news is the army is still -- the

primary institution of the country. and, still is loyal to a transition of the government. and what we ought to be saying is, we're asking for calm. there is going to be a transition and it will begin and the army is the protector of the transition to some kind of, if you will, representative government or participatory government in the country, and then get people back to work. the bad news in all of this is, our intelligence services, the egyptian intelligence service, israelis, were all caught flat-footed. bill: which is surprising. >> tunis, floated now to cairo, primarily, and there is -- none of this is happening in such scale in egypt except in cairo. that is the good news. martha: you can understand the administration's desire to not appear that they weren't being decisive and doing something and may be why we saw the call for, you know, has to happen now and we have thif the protesters sayt

go by friday and now that we have built up friday, tomorrow, what do you expect? >> the means by which the muslim brotherhood has gotten out the word and began with enormous violence last week after friday prayers and you will see that happen again this week, and, the emphasis on the word "now" precipitated by the administration, that will exacerbate this kind of a condition and my hope is what the administration will do is ask for and -- you have to do it repeatedly, calm, there is a transition underway and stop the instant rhetoric because, you could end up with a repeat of tehran. martha: the muslim brotherhood, you know, the word is there's a lot of -- secularists in egypt don't want to live under sharia law and when you create a power vacuum in a place like this under these conditions the possibility is there. how likely is it egypt goes the way of iran? >> i think you have a 50-50 situation now and i honestly say

that knowing this is the land of the pharaohs and a much closer connection to the west and yet we've set it up with our rhetoric, that we are encouraging people to bring this thing down and do it in such a hurry, the muslim brotherhood is the only institution left. that would be terrible. martha: all right, lieutenant colonel oliver north, good to see you, sir, we'll see you soon. bill: a great point about friday prayers, miami, oklahoma now, northeastern part of the state, two of the 8 are dead. we're now working to try and confirm the fate of the other six, six americans pulled from a -- on top of a truck that went into the spring river, a frozen river, at the heart of this blizzard. emergency crews there with the stretcher and gurney moving it down the frozen highway, closed for now and we have seen medical choppers on scene, we know the six have been taken to area hospitals, we are working to confirm their condition. right now, two dead, waiting on

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martha: as the 2012 campaign creeps onto the national stage i sat down with the man who will now get to try to get president obama reelected this time, and i asked him if in the beginning of the term, in the heat of the economic crisis, the president would then too tightly surrounded by his inner circle of chicago advisors, axelrod, rahm emanuel and jarrett, if he thought that was a mistake. >> we were very much into the day-to-day details of governing and dealings with the crisis and sometimes -- >> crisis mode. >> crisis mode and sometimes to the detriment of a larger message and, it detracted from the president's ability to speak to those larger things. and i think we have done better the last 60 days, and i feel good about where we are and

understanding there will be many challenges ahead. but, certainly, in the first two years, that was a problem. martha: a lot of changes. why all of those changes now. >> i think it is pretty natural, i think, the people, the president is bringing in now will make a tremendous contribution and i've known bill daley 30 years and i think he's incredibly wise, experienced person who will bring tremendous judgment and leadership to the white house and david david plouffe was my partner years and years and years and will bring direction and leadership to the white house and the economic team, i have deep respect for the people who have come in and will be cohesive and provide the president with fresh perspective. martha: one person looking folder to the change is his wife, susan axelrod who joined us in the interview.

martha: how do you feel about the fact that your husband is leaving this part of -- chapter behind, and coming back home to chicago? >> people say to me all the time how will it be to have him back and i say, define "back" i don't know what that will look like and we have made a lot of adjustments the last number of years, and, seems to go in these two-year cycles and we'll figure it out, it keeps us, maybe, younger. >> i'm excited that we are going to a movie in the afternoon this week. something we haven't done for a long time. there are lots of simple little things that we haven't been able to do and i'm just so thrilled to do that. but, that is the most remarkable person i know, and i have missed her. so i'm really looking forward to spending more time. martha: our viewers got to now your daughter, lauren, also, and how does she feel about her dad coming back home? >> she's thrilled. >> every conversation, that she ends with, i'm really excited you are coming home and she really, you can tell, she really

means it. martha: he happeny to be back he but a blackberry message away from the white house. bill: will the president miss having you down the hall? >> i hope so, we have been together a long time. though part of being together is a long time is you get in each at -- >> can you walk and say you are wrong about this. >> i'm able to do that but not always able to prevail. martha: talking about the last 60 days, how it feels difference, do you sense a change in him? is he more confident in his role. >> i think he's very secure. he more than anyone and anyone who sits in that chair, is aware that events can come that you don't anticipate and can really change things, for better are worse and we clearly have a lot of challenges in front of us. martha: including what is sure to be a hard fought re-election battle and by the way, axelrod will be in the center of that. martha: what will you be doing,

exactly? >> continuing to advise the president and advise his political operation the next year, and will cycle back into my same role as the senior strategist for the campaign. i know that next year will be all enveloping. martha: i want your quick impressions of a couple of potential opponents you might be facing. >> all fox news personalities. martha: a couple of those and others and i picked a couple names off the top of my head, because mitt romney seems to be at the top of the polls i see now. what do you think about running against him? >> he was a formidable governor and many of the elements of our health care plan were derived from his health care plan. martha: some people in massachusetts aren't happy with that. >> actually it is very popular, popular in massachusetts. i'm sure that you'll be... martha: what about sarah palin? >> she's an interesting person. i mean, i don't know, she has a robust broadcast career.

at fox. and, i don't know if she's going to want to give that up and the same with governor huckabee. formidable person and genial person, someone i personally like but i that have a great platform now and i don't know whether they will wanted to give that up. martha: would you relish a run against sarah palin. >> the republican nominations will show up and we'll have a good roadways. martha: cynical people who follow politics say they are already in campaign mode and the president knows he needs to capture the independent vote and people like david axelrod are heading to chicago to start the process. do you feel like you are in campaign mode already. >> there is a season for campaigning. and that season is not upon us yet. the american people want us to take a deep breath and sit down and work through problems, and there will be plenty of time for campaigns and i'm sure that the -- we'll have a robust one. martha: you know, that time between campaigns gets shorter and shorter all the time, though, right. bill: and will be robust. interesting stuff how he

analyzed his potential... martha: right after that, he said i don't want to get into too many details or names of people on the list but we'll go there shortly. bill: it is clear they have a wonderful marriage. martha: they do, very nice couple. bill: oklahoma is frozen this morning. and the scene in the spring river is stunning. two dead, waiting for word on the other six. that is next. [ male announcer ] a chicken coop: the unlikely birthplace of a fundamental idea. it's where ethel percy andrus found a reted teacher living because she could afford nothing else. ethel couldn't ignore the clear need for health and financial security. and it inspired her to found aarp. for over 50 years, we've continued that work, to help all americans pursue their best life. discover more of what we do, for every generation at aarp.org.

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bill: not everyone in chicago is driving in their cars, break out the snowmobile. you need it now, reports that one chicago firefighter rescued a mother who had delivered her newborn son. martha: i heard about that story. bill: and used the snowmobile to get her to an ambulance, and, also they use skis, cross-county

skis cruising through downtown and you can do that until it melts. martha: i love that. oklahoma's governor declaring a disaster as his state digs out from nearly two feet of snow in some areas, i'm showing you the ongoing rescue efforts, moments ago and the storm moved in, very fast. someone in the town of broken arrow captured the time release video, on someone's porch or backyard as a new round of snow, we are told, may be heading through and, our way over the next 4-5 days. bill: and, imagine, 10° in dallas, lights out across parts of texas and a rolling blackout cutting power and, freezing temps, and, and texans are urged to turn down the thermostat and 14,000 homes and businesses without power and customers facing up to 8 hours of rolling blackouts, today, it will melt

but not until saturday. martha: you need a snuggie! bill: try that! martha: all right, this story has really captivated the nation. the murder of an american missionary, shocking people, living along the u.s. border with mexico. and now the family of the 59-year-old nancy davis, is speaking out. our own steve harrigan is driving the entire length of the border to report on america's third war, that is coming up.

martha: we have sad news to report from oklahoma where we can now tell you that three of the people who were in that suv have now been reported dead as a report. we are waiting on the word for the other five people who we know were medivaced out of that area. an unbelievable story that we watched play out. bill: still uncertain as to how that car got into the driver.